Knowledge can always be acquired by the truly inquisitive. However, certain formats are better adapted to specific goals.
An encyclopedia—whether in print, CD-ROM, or online—tries to encompass all knowledge that is relevant to a subject. The user of an encyclopedia expects to find the answer to virtually all questions about the subject. The most typical use of an encyclopedia starts with a query and ends with separating the relevant article, or even paragraph, from the mass of information that comprises the encyclopedia. Few users of an encyclopedia sit down to read the entire contents. In other words, an encyclopedia does not provide any cohesive educational framework which might guide the student.
Computer format encyclopedias have used various strategies to move beyond the limited role of answering queries. Feature articles that change each time the program is launched try to redirect the reader's attention to new subjects. Slideshows and guided tours also use the encyclopedias resources to draw the reader into areas where self-directed queries would never have gone. Encyclopedias can answer questions and even entertain the reader with knowledge, but none document the reader's competence in a subject.
A preceptored (taught) course is fundamentally different than an encyclopedia. The purpose of a preceptored course is to assure that a student who completes the course requirements has competence in the subject. A course may draw on the resources of an encyclopedia, but the lessons are arranged and directed by a teacher who sets objectives. The best teachers incorporate the interests of their students into the design of the course, but the overall direction of the course is still defined by standards that are set by experts to insure competence.
Live teaching has a number of drawbacks—the teacher must be compensated, space must be found for the program, and participants must all meet at the appointed place.
Physicians strive to provide the highest possible quality of care to those who have requested their services. Comprehensive education is an essential component of quality care for a person having diabetes. Physicians providing high-quality diabetes care may find their job complicated by the limited time that patients have available to complete their evaluations and the prohibitive costs of extensive individual instruction.
Thus, there is a substantial need for an educational program which provides the benefits of both encyclopedic and preceptored education.
One area where there is a pressing need for an improved educational system is in the ongoing treatment of diabetes. Good diabetes care challenges a person who often has no symptoms to make significant lifestyle changes and to take numerous medications on the belief that reaching certain numerical goals in the present will reduce the risk of complications in the future. Diabetes education has been recognized as an essential component of good diabetes care. Diabetes education should help patients acquire the knowledge and support the attitudes necessary to accept this challenge.
Improved outcomes have been demonstrated when the primary care provider combines an intensive program of patient education with attention to recommended quality of care measures. However, diabetes education is expensive and inconvenient to provide, while tracking quality of care measures can be lost in the details of providing care to a broad range of patients in a busy practice. Referring patients to community classes, suggesting books or even diabetes references online do not assure that the individual patient will acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to reach accepted quality of care measures.
An intensification of treatment is more likely to be successful if the change is made as soon as the patient is motivated to change. This requires that education to inform and motivate patients be linked directly to the physicians and nurses who have the ability to help patients make changes in their diabetes care.
A preceptored course with frequent testing and free communication between teacher and student assures that the student who completes the requirements has competence in the subject. Frequent communication with a knowledgeable health care provider can also sustain the motivation of a patient to adhere to the complex and burdensome requirements of good diabetes care. It is, however, expensive to provide such an education.
Neither computer games nor interactive educational programs for diabetes are new. However, no current program integrates a preceptored course of instruction with the tracking of individual quality of care measures from the patient's clinical record.
There is a further need for an interactive, adaptive educational system which can be used to improve diabetes care.
There is also a particular need for an interactive Internet educational course providing an alternative to individual counseling